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A weekly wrap of the “must-know” developments in Marketing, Media, Agency and Technology for leaders and emerging leaders in the industry. Veteran industry journalist and Mi3 Executive Editor Paul McIntyre talks each week with guest marketers who are in the know on what matters at the nexus of marketing, agencies, media and technology. Powered mostly by Human Intelligence (HI).

  1. 1D AGO

    The rise of live shopping: eBay taps fandom, collectibles obsessions, and the consumer’s penchant for entertainment-laden commerce with debut of eBay Live in Australia as global spending looks set to hit $2bn by 2030.

    Live shopping, a blend of live video, real-time interaction and in-stream checkouts, is becoming a significant incremental ecommerce growth lever. Global figures suggest living shopping will tip an eye-watering US$2 trillion by 2030 and hit $1bn this year. It’s already revolutionising retail in Asian markets: Live shopping in China represents 80 per cent of the incremental growth in the ecommerce sector. A big driver for this gamified commerce phenomenon? FOMO. Per eBay research, almost half of Australians (48%) are driven by fear of missing out in their shopping habits, and one in two say they’ve missed out on coveted limited edition or rare items they would have liked to have purchase. With such insights to hand, eBay Live launched in Australia just in time for Christmas, coupling the livestream broadcasting format with its goods marketplace. First port of call: The growing collectables audience of buyers and sellers on its platform (30 per cent of Australians are collectors). Over the last 3-4 years, eBay took a position that it wasn’t going to be a marketplace for everyone and everything, says eBay head of marketing and communications, Zannie Abbott. Core categories for eBay include car parts and accessories, pre-loved fashion and the ballooning category of collectibles and trading cards.  “There are other places where you can buy your tissues and your nappies, but we really are the place to go for the things you love, and we have really doubled down in specific focus categories where we know we have a right to win here locally in Australia,” she says. “There is a perfect synergy around community, commerce and culture as an opportunity that really is ripe for us.” eBay Live has been natively built into the marketplace and app. Users can go straight into a live stream and start bidding and buying, participating in short auction bursts running for just seconds. The local rollout took a snappy six weeks thanks to learnings from US and UK launches, cross-functional collaboration and a “scrappy” all-in approach to innovation fuelled by a low-ego culture, says Abbott. Trust is at the heart of the offering, continues eBay Live category manager, Eric Chen. Every seller is vetted, handpicked as much for personality and broadcast potential as they are for their selling prowess. Tapping directly into FOMO and culture, eBay chose to make its first Aussie livestream secret, featuring AFL superstar, Buddy Franklin, who auctioned rare, signed AFL trading cards for just $0.01. The global trading card games market is forecast to grow to $18bn in the next five years. “It's incredibly exciting for everyone tuning in at the moment, but that also then turns into content afterwards that reaches a much bigger audience,” Chen says. “We just had a stream last week with Veronica Taylor, who was the original voice of Ash Ketchum for the Pokémon 30th anniversary event. These moments are something we’re able to build through eBay Live, which previously we didn't have a platform for, and create these special moments.” To grow awareness and education, eBay Live’s marketing strategy emphasises owned channels and grassroots connection. It’s leveraged five collectible toy events, undertaking live activations on stage to build momentum, interest and excitement in the entertainment-with-commerce proposition. Using the starting point of behaviour, iProspect national managing director, Marcelle Hoyek, says the agency worked with eBay to identify two audiences: Those ready for Live now, and those who will be ready sometime in future. Live wasn’t an unfamiliar concept, but the habit wasn’t ingrained, she points out. “It all starts with audience and that’s the biggest role we play with eBay when they’re launching something new into market,” she says. “Who's the audience? What are they into? What are their drivers? And what's the opportunity for us? Commercial data is indicating eBay is onto a winner. In the UK, one seller sold $1 million watches in three hours. A livestream featuring Pokémon cards clicked over $100,000 in one night. “There are a number of metrics we're monitoring as a business to understand whether we're getting traction or not, and that's everything from number of sellers to number of live streams to sales,” comments Abbott, adding a fine balance of new buyers coming to site, content density and number of sellers is critical to success. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

    54 min

  2. MAR 2

    The CMO Awards Podcast Episode 9: Fountains of knowledge: CMOs on the power of mid-profession learning

    Host: Nadia Cameron, Publisher | Editor – Marketing For Expedia Group country director and marketing activation lead, Philippa Durant, completing an MBA culminated in three leadership pillars reflecting her own personal brand: Kindness, passion and creativity. For Monash IVF head of marketing, Stuart Matthewman, securing a new formal tertiary qualification meant being uncomfortable – especially when squaring up to financial acumen – but also turned into growth and ultimately, compounding learning. And for Fitness and Lifestyle Group EGM of marketing and PR, Sara Dunseath, time at Harvard studying corporate revitalisation – “after a kick up the bum from my CEO” – fostered adaptability, confidence and relevance. These three marketing executives join Mi3 Publisher and CMO Awards program leader, Nadia Cameron in the first of our new series of CMO Awards podcasts for 2026 to explore how formal knowledge is power, and why these mid-career learning experiences have proven of such benefit professionally and personally. There’s no doubt the pressure is piling on marketing executives to be constantly learning and adapting their skill sets to suit rapidly changing marketing, business and customer environments. And it can be exhausting, all three agree – especially when there is such scrutiny of marketing ROI and an onus to know how to always deliver success. But surprisingly, taking the time to tackle formal learning in courses that first appeared to be outside the boundaries of the marketing function gave them renewed energy to tackle tasks at hand. Even more significantly, it elevated their own respect for the very discipline of marketing itself in organisations today. Tune into the conversation here. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

    55 min

  3. FEB 17

    ‘Inherently reckless’: Retailers’ inflated ‘owned media’ asset values are ‘wreaking havoc’; telcos, finance the biggest laggards in first global report on $573bn owned media sector

    Host: Paul McIntyre, Editor-At-Large Despite a multi-year boom, there’s an abundance of retail executive teams around the world disappointed with their retail media network initiatives - largely because of a misleading valuation method influencing what retailers think they can extract in advertising terms from their physical and digital store media assets. That’s one key finding in the first global report from Sonder on the owned media sector – that is, companies and brands with large customer bases which commercialise their publishing, retail and digital assets with suppliers, and increasingly advertisers beyond.  Sonder estimates owned media has a commercial potential of $573 billion – the global advertising business (paid media) is forecast to hit 1 trillion by 2028 or sooner.  But the bullish performance of retailers operating as media networks, partly fuelled by Amazon’s digital advertising romp, is masking some big challenges and a few open field revenue opportunities for some in commerce media, a derivative of retail media for telcos, airlines, financial services and others, says the Sonder 2026 Global Report on Owned Media. Andrew Lipsman is a former e-marketer analyst and currently a founding advisor and strategist at Colosseum, a specialist commerce and media advisory founded by the former president of Best Buy Ads, Media & CRM, Keith Ryan, in the US. Lipsman joins Sonder co-founders and report authors Jonathan Hopkins and Angus Frazer to unpack some wayward market developments slowly correcting and some new players shaking up the owned media model: ”There does seem to be a significant misconception here that e-commerce is way bigger than it actually is,” says Lipsman on one of the report’s findings that retail media networks and advertisers are locked on retailer digital assets - dwarfed in spending and customer volume by physical retail. Marketers are not following the money, say Lipsman and Sonder. Listen here for the full lowdown.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

    38 min

  4. FEB 12

    Why CommBank CMO Jo Boundy thinks brand content is a full funnel ‘silver bullet’ as consumption jumps 11%; News Australia report says ‘content ecosystems’ morphing to ‘brand worlds’

    Host: Paul McIntyre, Editor-At-Large When Jo Boundy greenlighted the second series of CommBank's financial wellbeing series The Brighter Side on Paramount 10, she expected good things but maybe not as good as the audience engagement levels turned out. The bank’s The Brighter Side  TV series garnered 2 million viewers. Tailored social content, which was  “double stacked” in production with the TV series, reached another 8 million in social media and Boundy says 80 per cent of people who watched the show “took an action to improve their finances … so we're seeing when the content is relevant, when it's utility, when it connects with people, it's really making a difference.” And Boundy is tantalisingly close to tagging her brand content program as a full funnel silver bullet. “It is such a critical piece in the full funnel tool kit,” she says. “It’s a really cluttered market so we have used our content to help build that consideration and then it ultimately goes through to conversion with customers.” It’s the latter point around creating compelling, relevant brand-originated content across rapidly changing formats and distribution channels that Nick Smith, Managing Director of content agency Medium Rare, says has spawned a “nuanced shift” from in-house “content ecosystems”, often led by corporate affairs teams or viewed through the lense of performance marketing. "That’s a company-centric approach,” says Smith on how corporate content ecosystems are typically run. “We’ve got to get particular messages out on our own channels and it’s lined up with the calendar of business objectives and all the things we want to tell the customer.” “Brand worlds” flip the content model to start with what “a consumer is doing in the real world,” says Smith. “It’s a different content approach than just talking about products.” Boundy says it’s a welcome shift – content starts with designing first for a customer problem or need. All of this new thinking and brand content trends has been captured in News Australia’s recent 2026 Future of Brand Content report – among the headline statistics is that brand content consumption is up 11 per cent. Trust and the relevance of brand-originated content among consumers increased by double digits. The former adman and CEO of WPP ANZ, Mike Connaghan, jumped from advertising to content when he was appointed to run News Australia’s commercial content division, which includes Medium Rare, Storyation, Suddenly and Visual Domain. Connaghan says the likes of CommBank, Qantas, Chemist Warehouse, Coles and Bunnings are all firing with their brand content programs. He agrees with Boundy that they drive results through the funnel to purchase, rather than just mid. “They’re creating mini publishing businesses for themselves,” says Connaghan. “We also work with Chemist Warehouse on the House of Wellness. It’s a media conglomerate. They have a huge print presence, they advertise very heavily through News Corp newspapers, they've got their own radio, they've got their own podcasts, they've got their own TV shows, all of which we are helping them with. It's a really powerful platform for them. So the sector is in high demand and high interest. Having people like Jo and Commonwealth Bank step into the breach in financial services has only really stirred more interest.” See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

    38 min

  5. FEB 2

    Gary Vee is doing Superbowl ads for Kellogg’s next week – here’s why he won’t buy more TV, what he thinks of the Brits, Ritson, classic marketing and attention metrics … and when social media’s time is up

    Host: Paul McIntyre, Editor-At-LargeGary ‘Vee’ Vaynerchuk says his pithy pro-social media views to circa 50 million followers are far more nuanced than the vast volumes of “Jersey boy competitive” social media sound bites let on.  Is two seconds of social media attention enough to work for a brand? No - he agrees with Amplified Intelligence founder Karen Nelson-Field, with a couple of caveats, of course. “Every brand listening right now can waste $10m on social media in five seconds,” he says on this week’s particularly fast-paced Mi3 Audio Edition. “I would buy unlimited television ads in Australia tomorrow, not the Super Bowl. You know what my problem is? I want to pay 20 cents in the dollar that the market is charging because I think that’s the actual value of the actual reach I’m getting, not the potential reach…” The founder of New York-based VaynerX and CEO of VaynerMedia, Vaynerchuk has more than 2000 staff plotted across the globe and a monstrous social media following built on sharp takedowns on everything and anything linked to legacy media and classic marketing theory and practice.  Equally, Vaynerchuk says there’s a fair chance he’ll be using the same mincer on social media in possibly five years. “When the attention veers away from social networks on mobile devices, which it will at some point, I will be the first person to make fun of people overspending on social media, including myself if I’m still doing it,” he says. “I'm aware that I love the Super Bowl ad, which is a classic ad. And I'm aware that in your setup that I that I do struggle with a programmatic ad, classic television spots, things of that nature. Let me break this down because it's a very smart audience that listens to your show.” As much as 45 minutes will allow, Vaynerchuk darts rapidly across themes but gets some way into the weeds on industry debate around: media and advertising’s long and short impacts for building brands attention and attribution metrics how blockchains will emerge as authenticity ledgers in the age of AI deep fakes why blue-chip companies have to be spending 20 per cent of their entire marketing budget on organic social production now - not media budgets to underwrite largely ineffective creative campaigns that don’t resonate with the public Take a listen to Gary Vee riffing at marketing’s deep end. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

    50 min

  6. 12/08/2025

    Redundancy repercussions: How marketing and media execs Liana Dubois, Katie Dally, Josh Slighting and Amy de Groot navigated the five stages of grief after job loss – then tapped lateral, imaginative thinking to make their next career choices

    Redundancy is rife across the marketing and agency ecosystem right now. And whether you have an inkling your job could be on the line, as Liana Dubois did when management consultants entered the Nine building, or it's a complete shock – such as Josh Slighting experienced when he left a growing REA Group, or Katie Dally felt after surviving a first round of cuts at Endeavour Group only to be hit in the second set – it often triggers a professional and personal crisis of confidence and identity. Even experienced marketer Amy De Groot, who’s been made redundant twice, nearly 20 years apart, still felt the shock, upset and grief of this occupational hazard. It’s hard to get a precise handle on the exact volume of redundancies, but cuts can be found in every pocket of the industry. A clue is in the Advertising Council of Australia’s 2025 Salary Survey, which revealed a redundancy rate of 11%, compared to the usual range of 5–7%, in the 12 months to 31 March 2025. More overtly, Omnicom’s global CEO last week said 4000 jobs are likely to be shed by end of the year as the merged Omnicom-IPG structure is bolted into place. Up to 120 people are also being made redundant as Menulog shuts up shop in Australia. Endeavour Group is another that made marketing, experience, digital and CX redundancies this year. Dentsu flagged 8% global headcount reduction in Q2. Nine, Seven, News Corp have made hundreds of cuts. The Australian HR Institute quarterly outlook for September 25 shows redundancies are on the rise, with 27 per cent of employers planning cuts, up 3 percentage points since the June 2025 quarter. Those are the numbers and an attempt at hard facts. But the reality is there are a bunch of marketing and advertising industry colleagues having the cope with the fallout and impact of being made redundant. In Mi3’s latest podcast, we’re focusing on exploring the impact of the redundancy crisis through the lens of four senior marketers who have been there: Former Nine group CMO, Liana Dubois; former REA Group media lead, Josh Slighting, former Endeavour Group GM of brand, creative and operations, Katie Dally, and former Cars24 head of brand marketing, Amy de Groot. In this very personal conversation, we humanise the experience of being made redundant to help others out there that have, or are experiencing, the repercussions of redundancy directly and indirectly. We also explore the lateral career paths that have opened up for our guests, as we share learnings and advice on how we can all make more progressive career choices. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

    1h 3m

  7. 11/17/2025

    Marketing Gold: How Australian Redcross Lifeblood used TV to deliver a 120% increase in appointments, and KitKat made Gen Z penetration sales gains by taking ‘Have a Break’ to gamers

    Marketing effectiveness: How we all strive to achieve it. In today’s episode, two very distinctive takes on successful work, from the verticals and business objectives in play, to audience targeting, messaging and channels used – traditional media through to gaming streaming – are in the spotlight. And both landed their brand leaders and agencies coveted Gold Effies at this year’s Advertising Council Australia Awards. Scoring two Gold gongs was Australian Red Cross Lifeblood and Clemenger BBDO for ‘Lifeblood Blood Supply: How a media first, elevated blood donation into a national news story, saving up to 28,848 lives’ . The pair leveraged a well-established idea – the emergency warning system and media ticker – plus a partnership with the Seven Network to create a mechanism showing the blood supply in a real-time way via the nightly news bulletin, with state-based tailoring, supported through TVCs, integrations with AFL broadcasts and ambassadors and digital capabilities. Lifeblood CMO, Jeremy Weiss says the “behaviour changing” campaign led to a 120% boost in blood donation appointments, along with new donor registrations signing up, were tentpole results. As each new donor saves up to three lives with their first donation, they more than quadrupled the number of intended lives saved. In contrast, Nestle Australia and VML Australia were honoured with their Gold Effie for their work on extending the iconic ‘Have a break, have a Kitkat’ creative platform into the edgier, decidedly younger media platform, Twitch and streaming. The aim of the ‘Break Chair’ was to connect with Gen Zers aged 18-27, 80% of which engage in gaming – many doing it often. Forging that sense of connection, emotion and engagement on the consumer’s terms played a big part here. The “boundary pushing” mix of tapping influencers, livestreaming, a killer consumer insight on needing regular breaks, and an already distinctive creative platform further compounded impact and results including brand and penetration gains to sales lift, says Nestle head of marketing confectionery, Shannon Wright. Joined by Alison Tilling, chief strategy officer, VML Australia, and Frank Curcio, national head of product, Clemenger BBDO, our guests unpack their work and the surprising similarities behind their distinctively different but seriously impactful work. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

    58 min

  8. 11/13/2025

    The rise of luxury retail media: Selfridges, Disney combine for unprecedented retail media Xmas campaign – as up-market department stores globally position for next growth wave from non-endemic brands

    British luxury department store Selfridges has just launched a Christmas campaign co-created with Disney across almost the entire Selfridges portfolio of in-store and digital media assets. Now it’s pushing harder into retail media – and looking for similarly deep relationships with select brands aiming to tap its 36 million annual customers. Selfridges head of brand partnerships Kate Eastop is driving that agenda – and bringing in more non-endemic brands, i.e. those it doesn’t stock in stores – into the retail media business. “I see this as a significant growth area for the business over the next few years”, says Eastop. So, she commissioned owned media advisor Sonder to develop a rate card for its physical and digital assets – and ensure everything is properly valued. The new rates will be live for 2026 and Eastop says the process has helped “establish Selfridges as a serious player in retail media” while bringing internal stakeholders together on the kind of assets and partnerships the luxury retailer will build – and what remains off limits. Sonder’s Jonathan Hopkins and Angus Frazer see momentum in the luxury retail media market as the supermarket and grocery sector matures. They say brands are willing to pay a higher premium to tap audiences that are more immersed in “retail theatre” experiences versus the transactional hit of the grocery aisle. “If you’re walking into a theatre of brands in a store like Selfridges, then there is immense dwell time,” per Hopkins. “You’re there to enjoy the shopping experience, not get out as quickly as possible – so those factors are considered in the valuation.” Sonder has benchmarked a global owned media asset pool of circa $12bn – and Frazer says the market is “approaching an inflection point” with in-store static and digital assets now presenting “the next wave of opportunity” for retail media networks versus commoditised low hanging fruit, like sponsored search and website product tiles. He says the department stores Sonder has worked with on owned media “typically top out at around 25 per cent of revenues being derived from non-endemic brands”. Key to netting that upside is not being too greedy and eroding both the customer experience, the value of the brand, and thereby undermining the sustainability of the retail media business. Their advice? Partner wisely.  “Deep with a few can be better than light with many,” says Hopkins. “Find brands that are a really good fit with your customers and go deep in terms of those brand partnerships across the year. Find those mutually beneficial activations that are going to add value to your customers that you could never have achieved without that partnership. “If you manage to achieve that, it’s going to create a proven use case within the business, start to normalise behaviour for stakeholders who might have been resistant to it, and then make it easier for future growth.” Which is precisely the playbook that Selfridges is following – and carving out a deeper niche within the UK’s increasingly crowded retail media market. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

    45 min
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About

A weekly wrap of the “must-know” developments in Marketing, Media, Agency and Technology for leaders and emerging leaders in the industry. Veteran industry journalist and Mi3 Executive Editor Paul McIntyre talks each week with guest marketers who are in the know on what matters at the nexus of marketing, agencies, media and technology. Powered mostly by Human Intelligence (HI).

Information

  • Creator
    Mi3 & iHeart Podcasts Australia
  • Years Active
    2019 - 2026
  • Episodes
    415
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Mi3
  • Show Website
    Mi3 Audio Edition

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